Changes

= Importance of What is Self-Observation =

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">There are four necessities of man's self-expansion if he is not to remain this being We have in all functionings of the surface ignorance seeking obscurely after mentality four elements, the truth object of things and collecting and systematising fragments and sections mental consciousness, the act of knowledgemental consciousness, the small limited occasion and halfthe subject. In the self-competent creature experience of the cosmic Force which he now self-observing inner being, the object is in his phenomenal nature. He must know himself and discover and utilise all his potentialities: but to know himself and always some state or movement or wave of the world completely he must go behind his own and its exteriorconscious being, anger, he must dive deep below his own mental surface and the physical surface of Nature. This he can only do by knowing his inner mentalgrief or other emotion, hunger or other vitalcraving, impulse or inner life reaction or some form of sensation, physical and psychic being and its powers and movements and the universal laws and processes perception or thought activity. The act is some kind of the occult Mind mental observation and Life which stand behind the material front conceptual valuation of the universe….But this knowledge must be something more than a creed movement or wave or else a mystic revelation; his thinking mind must mental sensation of it in which observation and valuation may be able to accept it, to correlate it with the principle of things involved and the observed truth of the universe: this is the work of philosophyeven lost, and —so that in this act the field of mental person may either separate the truth of act and the spirit it can only be done object by a spiritual philosophy, whether intellectual in its method distinguishing perception or intuitiveconfuse them together indistinguishably. (The Mother, 18 June 1958)</span><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/0921/18memory-juneego-1958and-self-experience#p3p5</ref></u>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">The Upanishad tells us that You may have a mental power of observation, a vital power of observation, a physical power of observation. When you observe ideas, for instance, the Self-existent has so set the doors train of ideas, the soul that they turn outwards and most men look outward into the appearances logic of things; only the rare soul that ideas, it is ripe for a calm thought and steady wisdom turns its eye inward, sees not altogether the Self and attains to immortality. To this turning same power of the eye inward psychological self-observation as when you look at a friend doing athletics and </span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">analysis see whether he is a great and effective introductionmaking his movements correctly or not. We can look into That is, the inward capacity of ourselves more easily than we can look into the inward of things external to us because attention is there, in things outside usboth cases, we are but it works in a different field. It can't be said that it is one part of the first place embarrassed by being observing the form and secondly we have no natural previous experience of that in them which is other than their physical substance….psychological self-knowledge others; it is only the experience faculty of the modes observation developing in each part of the Selfbeing—that is, it is not the realisation faculty of the Self in its pure beingconcentration and attention.</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2306/the27-status-ofjanuary-knowledge1954#p7p34</ref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>The true and ultimate, as distinguished from the immediate or intermediate importance of our observing, reasoning, inquiring, judging intelligence is that it prepares the human being for the right reception and right action of a Light from above which must progressively replace in him the obscure light from below that guides the animal..Man can bring an enlightened will, an enlightened thought and enlightened emotions to the difficult work of his self-development; he can more and more subject to these more conscious and reflecting guides the inferior function of desire. In proportion as he can thus master and enlighten his lower self, he is man and no longer an animal. When he can begin to replace desire altogether by a still greater enlightened thought and sight and will in touch with the Infinite, consciously subject to a diviner will than his own, linked to a more universal and transcendent knowledge, he has commenced the ascent towards the superman; he is on his upward march towards the Divine.~</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/self-consecration#p17</refcenter>

= What This sensational thought-mind which is based upon sense, memory, association, first ideas and resultant generalisations or secondary ideas, is common to Observe =all developed animal life and mentality….The intelligence and will of the animal are involved in the sense-mind and therefore altogether governed by it and carried on its stream of sensations, sense-perceptions, impulses; it is instinctive. Man is able to use a reason and will, a self-observing, thinking and all-observing, an intelligently willing mind which is no longer involved in the sense-mind, but acts from above and behind it in its own right, with a certain separateness and freedom. He is reflective, has a certain relative freedom of intelligent will. He has liberated in himself and has formed into a separate power the buddhi. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/purification-intelligence-and-will#p4</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">There are many voices, and The ordinary mind knows itself only as an ego with all are not divine; this may be only a voice the movements of desire. All that keeps one faithful to the Truth nature in a jumble and insists on peace, purityidentifying itself with these movements, devotionthinks "I am doing this, feeling that, sinceritythinking, a spiritual change in joy or in sorrow etc." The first beginning of real self-knowledge is when you feel yourself separate from the nature can be listened to with profit; the rest must be observed with discrimination in you and its movements and not followed blindly. Keep the fire then you see that there are many parts of aspiration burningyour being, but avoid all impatient hastemany personalities each acting on its own behalf and in its own way.</div> <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/3028/innerthe-voicespsychic-and-indicationbeing#p84</ref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">The idea of the three essential modes of Nature is a creation of the ancient Indian thinkers '''Active and its truth is not at once obvious, because it was the result of long psychological experiment and profound internal experience. Therefore without a long inner experience, without intimate self-observation and intuitive perception of the Nature-forces it is difficult to grasp accurately or firmly utilise. Still certain broad indications may help the seeker on the Way of Works to understand, analyse and control by his assent or refusal the </span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">combinations of his own nature. These modes are termed in the Indian books qualities, guṇas, and are given the names sattva, rajas, tamas. Sattwa is the force of equilibrium and translates in quality as good and harmony and happiness and light; rajas is the force of kinesis and translates in quality as struggle and effort, passion and action; tamas is the force of inconscience and inertia and translates in quality as obscurity and incapacity and inaction. Ordinarily used for psychological self-analysis, these distinctions are valid also in physical Nature. Each thing and every existence in the lower Prakriti contains them and its process and dynamic form are the result of the interaction of these qualitative powers.</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the-three-modes-of-nature#p2</ref>Passive Observation'''

= Process Your consciousness becomes a screen or mirror; but this is when you are in a state of Selfcontemplation, a mere observer; when you are active, it is like a searchlight. You have only to turn it on, if you want to see luminously and examine penetratingly anything in any place. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/30-Observation =june-1929#p7</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">You project yourself on the screen and then observe and see all that '''Observation is moving there and how it moves and what happens. You make a little diagram, it becomes so interesting then. And then, after a while, when you are quite accustomed to seeing, you can go one step further and take a decision. Or even a still greater step: you organise—arrange, take up all that, put each thing in its place, organise in such a way that you begin to have a straight movement with an inner meaning. And then you become conscious of your direction and are able to say: "Very well, it will be thus; my life will develop in that way, because that is the logic of my being. Now, I have arranged all that within me, each thing has been put in its place, and so naturally a central orientation is forming. I am following this orientation. One step more and I know what will happen to me for I myself am deciding it....".</div>Not Discernment'''

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother ,29 July 1953)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/29-july-1953#p47</ref></u></span> <div style="color:#000000;">But you must begin when very small, and consciously, very consciously; you must begin with a see For the capacity of observation of all the movements in yourself, of their relation with others, of—precisely, of your degree of independence, real individuality, of knowing where impulses come from, where other movements come from: whether it is contagion from outside or something that arises from within yourself. A very profound study of all the movements in oneself is necessary in order to succeed simply in crystallising a being who is a little conscious, a little conscious.</div><div style="color:#000000;">(The Mother,22 September 1954)</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/22-september-1954#p43</ref></u></div> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">It is must not a physical retirement that is needed, but an inner detachment from the mental formations and vital desires. To find the real self above and within and live in that, not in the mind's conceptions or the vital's reactions. These must be observed and looked at not as one's own but as movements of a surface ignorant nature.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/interactions-confused with-others-and-the-practice-of-yoga#p111</ref></u></span> = Conditions for Self-Observation = == Quiet Mind == <div style="color:#000000;">It is only when we follow the yogic process capacity of quieting the mind itself that a profounder result of our self-observation becomes possiblediscernment.</div><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/indeterminates-cosmic-determinations-and-the-indeterminable#p12</ref></u></span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">It Discernment is in the quiet mind that the true observation and knowledge come.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/quiet-and-calm#p40</ref></u></span> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">A quiet mind does not mean that there will be no thoughts or mental movements at all, but that these will be on the surface and you will feel your true being within separate from them, observing but not carried away, able to watch and judge them and reject all that has to be rejected and to accept and keep to all that is true consciousness and true experience.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/peace#p10</ref></u></span> <div style="color:#000000;">But if you remain very quiet, only if you observe—as though you were silently looking at something, you understand—then you will begin seeing more precisely, and little by little distinguishing between different categories of things. You will be able to know what one thing is and what another etc., whether it comes from you or from outside, whether it is on a material plane or on another plane. All this is learnt through a very quiet observation, quiet but very sharp, you understand; because there are very tiny shades, very tiny, between different things, and when you get used to distinguishing these nuances, you can discern exactly what it is.</div><div style="color:#000000;">(The Mother,20 October 1954)</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/20-october-1954#p46</ref></u></div> == Silence == <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">It is really an inner silence that is needed—a something silent within that looks at outer talk and action but feels it as something superficial, not as itself and is quite indifferent and untouched by itintellectual capacity. It can bring forces to support speech and action or it can stop them by withdrawal or it can let them go on and observe without being involved or moved.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/speech-and-yoga#p76</ref></u></span> <div style="color:#000000;">...You must be able to silence your head absolutely and be completely detached, not to have (for example, when you are looking for the solution of Something like a problem), not to have judgment already in your head the solution that seems to you right or the best or most profitable. That must not be there. You must become absolutely like a blank paper, with nothing on enters into it. And you proceed in that way, with a very sincere aspiration to know the truth, without assuming beforehand that it will be like this or like that; because otherwise you will see only your own formation. The very first condition is that the head must keep completely silent during the time one is observing.</div> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother , 30 September 1953)</span><span style=what we call "background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;discrimination"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/30-september-1953#p13</ref></u></span> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">To silence the mind it is not enough to throw back each thought as it comes, that you can only be a subordinate movement. One must get back from all thought and be separate from it, a silent consciousness observing the thoughts if they come, but not oneself thinking or </span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">identified with the thoughts. Thoughts must be felt as outside things altogether. It is then easier to reject thoughts or let them pass without their disturbing distinguish between the quietude origin of the mind.</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/interactions-with-others-one thing and-the-practice-of-yoga#p99</ref> = Right Attitude for Self-Observation = == Witness Attitude == <div style="color:#000000;">Have you never felt this? As though you were a little behind or above things, and were looking at them taking place but were not doing anything yourself? Witness means an observeranother, someone who looks on and does not act himself. So, when the mind is very quiet, one can withdraw a little in this way from circumstances and look at things as though he were a witness, a spectator, and not participating in the action himself. This gives you a great detachment, a great quietude, and also a very precise see of the reciprocal value of these things, because it cuts the attachment to action. When you know how to do this with yourself, when you can withdraw and watch yourself acting, you learn many things about yourself. When you are all mixed up and take part in the action, you do not observe yourself acting, you don't know what you are like. But when you draw back and look at yourself, you can perceive many imperfections which you wouldn't have seen otherwise.</div> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother,13 October 1954)</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/13-october-1954#p2</ref>  <div style="color:#000000;">It has been seen that a most effective way of purification is for the mental Purusha to draw back, ought to stand as the passive witness and observe and know himself and the workings of Nature in the lower, the normal being; but this must be combined, for perfection, with founded on a will to raise the purified nature into the higher spiritual being. When that is done, the Purusha is no longer only a witness, but also the master of his prakriti, īśvara.</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-action-of-the-divine-shakti#p7</ref></u></div> <div style="color:#000000;">The witness Purusha in the mind observes that the inadequacy of his effort, all the inadequacy in fact of man's life and nature arises from the separation and the consequent struggle, want of knowledge, want of harmony, want of oneness. It is essential for him to grow out of separative individuality, to universalise himself, to make himself one with the universe. This unification can be done only through the soul by making our soul of mind one with the universal Mind, our soul of life one with the universal Life-soul, our soul of body one with the universal soul of physical Nature.</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-perfection-of-the-mental-being#p15</ref></u></div> == Being Sincere and Impartial == For that you must be absolutely sincere and impartialcorrect observation. You must observe yourself as if you were observing and criticising a third person. You must not start with an idea that this is your life's mission, this is your particular capacity, this you are to do or that you are to do, in this lies your talent or genius, etc. That will carry you away from the right track. It is not the liking or disliking of your external being, your mental or vital or physical choice that determines the true line of your growth. Nor should you take up the opposite attitude and say, "I am good for nothing in this matter, I am useless in that one; it is not for me." Neither vanity and arrogance nor self-depreciation and false modesty should move you. As I said, you must be absolutely impartial and unconcerned. You should be like a mirror that reflects the truth and does not judge. <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother ,12 November 1952)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/15/12-november-1952#p6</ref></u></span> == Being Vigilant == <div style="color:#000000;">One can be quiet, happy, cheerful without being all that in a light or shallow way—and the happiness need not bring any vital reaction. All that you need to do is to be observant and vigilant,—watchful so that you may not give assent to wrong movements or the return of the old feelings, darkness, confusion etc. Not fear, but vigilance. If you remain vigilant, then with the increase of the Force upholding you, a power of self-control will come, a power to see and reject the wrong turn or the wrong reaction when it observation comes.</div> <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/fear#p12</ref> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">But you have only to observe yourselves... you can observe yourself, catch yourself at least a hundred times a day, with a mind which decides everything, knows everything, judges everything, knows very well what is good, what badfirst, what is true, what false, what is right.discernment follows.. And also how one should act, what this person should have done, how to resolve that problem.... All men know, you see... If they were at the head of governments, for instance, they would know very well how to manage everything! But people don't listen to them... that's all!</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother,21 July 1954)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0603/2130-julyjune-19541929#p40p7</ref></u></span>

== Becoming Aware of Desire What to Observe ==

<div style="color:#000000;">For that you must observe yourself very, very attentively, and if there is anything in you which produces something like One can prepare the body through a small intense vibrationseries of observations, then you may be sure that there lies a desire. For examplestudies, you sayunderstandings, "This food is necessary for me"—you believeby showing it examples, you imagine, you think that you need such and such a thing and you find the necessary means to obtain the thing. To know if making it is understand things as one makes a need or a desirechild understand them, either by observing its own movements―but generally, you must look at yourself very closely and ask yourselfin this, "What will happen if I cannot get the thing?" Then if the immediate answer one iscomparatively blind!―or by observing those of others. And in a more general way, "Oh, it this preparation will be very bad"based on recognised studies, on clear facts. Like this, you may be sure for instance: that it is a matter certain number of desire. It is the same for everything. For every problem you draw backpersons, placed in exactly similar circumstances, look at yourself and askexperience, "Let us seeeach one of them, am I going to have the thing?" If at that moment something very different effects. One may go even further: in you jumps up with joya given set of definite circumstances, you may be certain there is a desire. On the other handcertain number of particular, if something tells youdefinite individuals, "Oh, I am not going to get it"in apparently quite identical conditions, and you feel very depressedfor some the effects are catastrophic, then again it is a desirewhile others escape without any harm. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/4-july-1956#p15</divref>

<div style="color:#000000;">But For a larger mental being is there within us, a time comes when instead of doing things automaticallylarger inner vital being, impelled by even a larger inner subtle-physical being other than our surface body-consciousness , and force of which one is quite unaware—a time comes when one by entering into this or becoming it, identifying ourselves with it, we can observe what goes on in oneselfthe springs of our thoughts and feelings, study one's movements, find their causesthe sources and motives of our action, the operative energies that build up our surface personality. For we discover and at can know the same time begin to exercise a control first over what goes on within inner being that secretly thinks and perceives in us, then on the influence cast on us from outside which makes vital being that secretly feels and acts upon life through us act, in the beginning altogether unconsciously and almost involuntarily, but gradually more and more consciously; subtle-physical being that secretly receives and responds to the will can wake up contacts of things through our body and reactits organs. Then at that momentOur surface thought, feeling, the moment there emotion is a conscious will capable complexity and confusion of reacting, one may say, "I have become conscious." This does not mean that it is a total impulsions from within and perfect consciousnessimpacts from outside us; our reason, our organising intelligence can impose on it means that it is a beginningonly an imperfect order: for example, when one is able to observe all but here within we find the reactions in one's being and to have a certain control over them, to let those one approves separate sources of have playour mental, our vital and to controlour physical energisms and can see clearly the pure operations, stopthe distinct powers, annul those one doesn't approve the composing elements ofeach and their interplay in a clear light of self-vision. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/knowledge-by-identity-and-separative-knowledge#p12</divref>

<div style="color:#000000;">('''The Mother, 28 November 1956)</div>Three Modes of Nature'''

<div style="color:#0066ccThe idea of the three essential modes of Nature is a creation of the ancient Indian thinkers and its truth is not at once obvious, because it was the result of long psychological experiment and profound internal experience. Therefore without a long inner experience, without intimate self-observation and intuitive perception of the Nature-forces it is difficult to grasp accurately or firmly utilise. Still certain broad indications may help the seeker on the Way of Works to understand, analyse and control by his assent or refusal the combinations of his own nature. These modes are termed in the Indian books qualities, guṇas, and are given the names sattva, rajas, tamas. Sattwa is the force of equilibrium and translates in quality as good and harmony and happiness and light; rajas is the force of kinesis and translates in quality as struggle and effort, passion and action;"><u>tamas is the force of inconscience and inertia and translates in quality as obscurity and incapacity and inaction. Ordinarily used for psychological self-analysis, these distinctions are valid also in physical Nature. Each thing and every existence in the lower Prakriti contains them and its process and dynamic form are the result of the interaction of these qualitative powers. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/0823/28the-novemberthree-1956modes-of-nature#p19p2</ref></u></div>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>As a general rule, with a few very rare exceptions, men are content to observe more or less accurately everything that happens around them, and sometimes within themselves, and to classify all these observations according to one superficial system of logic or another. And they call this organisation, these systems, "knowledge". It has never occurred to them, they have not even begun to perceive that all the things they see, touch, feel, experience, are false appearances and not reality itself.~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/10/aphorism-7#p3</ref></u></spancenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">It is evident that our state on a tremendous field of observation—there is no end to the surface discoveries you can make in your dreams. But there is indeed a state of knowledge, so far as it goes, but a limited knowledge enveloped and invaded by ignorance and, one important point: you must not go to a sleep when you are very large extenttired, by reason of its limitationfor if you do, itself you fall into a kind sort of ignoranceunconsciousness in which dreams do whatever they like with you, at best a mixed knowledge-ignoranceand you have no reaction. It could Just as I said that you should not be otherwise since our awareness of the world is born of a separative and surface observation with only an indirect means of cognition at its disposal; our knowledge of ourselveseat without having taken rest, though more direct, is stultified by its restriction I would advise everyone to rest before going to the surface of our being, by an ignorance of our true self, the true sources of our nature, the true motive-forces of our </span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">actionsleep. It is quite evident And for that we , you must know ourselves with only a superficial knowledge,—the sources of our consciousness and thought are a mystery; the true nature of our mind, emotions, sensations is a mystery; our cause of being and our end of being, the significance of our life and its activities are a mystery: this could not be if we had a real self-knowledge and a real world-knowledgehow to rest.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2115/knowledge-by-identity1-andfebruary-separative-knowledge1951#p7p14</ref></u></span>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>One throws oneself out all the time; all the time one lives, as it were, outside oneself, in such a superficial sensation that it is almost as though one were outside oneself. As soon as one wants even to observe oneself a little, control oneself a little, simply know what is happening, one is always obliged to draw back or pull towards oneself, to pull inwards something which is constantly like that, on the surface. And it is this surface thing which meets all external contacts, puts you in touch with similar vibrations coming from others. That happens almost outside you.~</div><div style="color:#000000;">(The Mother , 20 June 1956)</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/20-june-1956#p49</ref></u></divcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">If we observe a happening, we judge and explain it from the result and from a glimpse of its most external constituents, circumstances or causes; but each happening Why is the outcome of a complex nexus of forces which we do not and cannot observe, because all forces are to us invisible,—but they are not invisible to the spiritual vision of the Infinite: some of them are actualities working to produce or occasion a new actuality, some are possibles that are near to the preSelf-existent actuals and in a way included in their aggregate; but there can intervene always new possibilities that suddenly become dynamic potentials and add themselves to the nexus, and behind all are imperatives or an imperative which these possibilities are labouring to actualise.</div>Observation Important? =

<div style="color...if he [man] is not to remain this being of the surface ignorance seeking obscurely after the truth of things and collecting and systematising fragments and sections of knowledge, the small limited and half-competent creature of the cosmic Force which he now is in his phenomenal nature. He must know himself and discover and utilise all his potentialities:#0066ccbut to know himself and the world completely he must go behind his own and its exterior, he must dive deep below his own mental surface and the physical surface of Nature. This he can only do by knowing his inner mental, vital, physical and psychic being and its powers and movements and the universal laws and processes of the occult Mind and Life which stand behind the material front of the universe. ...But this knowledge must be something more than a creed or a mystic revelation;"><u>his thinking mind must be able to accept it, to correlate it with the principle of things and the observed truth of the universe: this is the work of philosophy, and in the field of the truth of the spirit it can only be done by a spiritual philosophy, whether intellectual in its method or intuitive. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2109/brahman-purusha-ishwara-maya18-prakritijune-shakti1958#p7p3</ref></u></div>

== Three Guna’s To work for your perfection, the first step is to become conscious of yourself, of the different parts of your being and Selftheir respective activities. You must learn to distinguish these different parts one from another, so that you may become clearly aware of the origin of the movements that occur in you, the many impulses, reactions and conflicting wills that drive you to action. It is an assiduous study which demands much perseverance and sincerity. For man's nature, especially his mental nature, has a spontaneous tendency to give a favourable explanation for everything he thinks, feels, says and does. It is only by observing these movements with great care, by bringing them, as it were, before the tribunal of our highest ideal, with a sincere will to submit to its judgment, that we can hope to form in ourselves a discernment that never errs. For if we truly want to progress and acquire the capacity of knowing the truth of our being, that is to say, what we are truly created for, what we can call our mission upon earth, then we must, in a very regular and constant manner, reject from us or eliminate in us whatever contradicts the truth of our existence, whatever is opposed to it. In this way, little by little, all the parts, all the elements of our being can be organised into a homogeneous whole around our psychic centre. This work of unification requires much time to be brought to some degree of perfection. Therefore, in order to accomplish it, we must arm ourselves with patience and endurance, with a determination to prolong our life as long as necessary for the success of our endeavour. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/12/the-science-of-Observation ==living#p5</ref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>In this progression the first step is a certain detached superiority to the three modes of Nature. The soul is inwardly separated and free from the lower Prakriti, not involved in its coils, indifferent and glad above it. Nature continues to act in the triple round of her ancient habits,—desire, grief and joy attack the heart, the instruments fall into inaction and obscurity and weariness, light and peace come back into the heart and mind and body; but the soul stands unchanged and untouched by these changes. Observing and unmoved by the grief and desire of the lower members, smiling at their joys and their strainings, regarding and unoverpowered by the failing and the darknesses of the thought and the wildness or the weaknesses of the heart and nerves, uncompelled and unattached to the mind's illuminations and its relief and sense of ease or of power in the return of light and gladness, it throws itself into none of these things, but waits unmoved for the intimations of a higher Will and the intuitions of a greater luminous knowledge.~</spancenter>

<div style=… if each element which comes with its ignorance, its unconsciousness, its egoism, is put before the will to change and one remains awake, compares, observes, studies and slowly acts, that becomes infinitely interesting, one makes marvellous and quite unexpected discoveries. One finds in oneself lots of small hidden folds, little things one had not seen at the beginning; one undertakes a sort of inner chase, goes hunting into small dark corners and tells oneself: "What, I was like that! This was there in me, I am harbouring this little thing"color:#0066cc;—sometimes so sordid, so mean, so nasty. And once it has been discovered, how wonderful! One puts the light upon it and it disappears and you no longer have those reactions which made you so sad before, when you used to say, "><u>Oh! I shall never get there. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2304/the-three19-modesapril-of-nature1951#p13p14</ref></u></div>

<div style="color:#000000;">Have If you ever practised distinguishing what comes had that observation (from your mindthe inner spiritual, what comes from your vitalnot the outer intellectual and ethical viewpoint), what comes from your physical?... For then it is mixed up; it is mixed up in the outward appearance. If would be comparatively easy for you do not take care to distinguish, it makes a kind get out of soup, all that together. So it is indistinct and difficult to discover. But if you observe yourself, after some time you see certain things, you feel them to be there, like that, as though they were in your skindifficulties; for some other things you feel instance you would have to go within yourself find at once where this irrational impulse to find out flee away came from where they come; for other things, you and it would not have to go still further inside, or otherwise any hold upon you have to rise up a little: it comes from unconsciousness. And there are others; then you must go very deepOf course, very deep all that can only be done to find out the best effect when you stand back from where they comethe play of your nature and become the Witness-Control or the Spectator-Actor Manager. This But that is just a beginningwhat happens when you take this kind of self-seeing posture. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/mental-difficulties-and-the-need-of-quietude#p23</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>(The Mother , 10 June 1953)~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/10-june-1953#p31</ref></u></spancenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">To work for your perfectionThe true and ultimate, as distinguished from the first step is to become conscious immediate or intermediate importance of yourselfour observing, reasoning, inquiring, of judging intelligence is that it prepares the different parts of your human being for the right reception and their respective activities. You right action of a Light from above which must learn to distinguish these different parts one progressively replace in him the obscure light from another, so below that you may become clearly aware of guides the origin of the movements that occur in you, the many impulsesanimal. ...Man can bring an enlightened will, reactions and conflicting wills that drive you to action. It is an assiduous study which demands much perseverance enlightened thought and sincerity. For man's nature, especially his mental nature, has a spontaneous tendency enlightened emotions to give a favourable explanation for everything he thinks, feels, says and does. It is only by observing these movements with great care, by bringing them, as it were, before the tribunal difficult work of our highest ideal, with a sincere will to submit to its judgment, that we can hope </span><span style="backgroundhis self-color:transparentdevelopment;color:#000000;">he can more and more subject to form in ourselves a discernment that never errs. For if we truly want to progress these more conscious and acquire reflecting guides the capacity inferior function of knowing the truth of our beingdesire. In proportion as he can thus master and enlighten his lower self, that he is man and no longer an animal. When he can begin to say, what we are truly created for, what we can call our mission upon earth, then we must, in replace desire altogether by a very regular still greater enlightened thought and constant manner, reject from us or eliminate sight and will in us whatever contradicts touch with the truth of our existenceInfinite, whatever is opposed consciously subject to it. In this way, little by little, all the parts, all the elements of our being can be organised into a homogeneous whole around our psychic centre. This work of unification requires much time to be brought to some degree of perfection. Thereforediviner will than his own, in order linked to accomplish it, we must arm ourselves with patience a more universal and endurancetranscendent knowledge, with a determination to prolong our life as long as necessary for he has commenced the ascent towards the superman; he is on his upward march towards the success of our endeavourDivine.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/1223/theself-science-of-livingconsecration#p5p17</ref></u></span>

<div style="color:#000000;">….You may have a mental power of observation, a vital power of observation, a physical power of observation. When you observe ideas, for instance, the train of ideas, the logic of the ideas, it is not altogether the same power of observation as when you look at a friend doing athletics and see whether he is making his movements correctly or not. That is, the capacity of attention is there in both cases, but it works in a different field. It can't be said that it is one part of the being observing the others; it is the faculty of observation developing in each part of the being—that is, the faculty of concentration and attention. For the capacity of observation must not be confused with the capacity of discernment. Discernment is an intellectual capacity. Something like a judgment already enters into it, what we call "discrimination": you can distinguish between the origin of one thing and of another, and the reciprocal value of these things. But that ought How to be founded on a correct observation. The power of observation comes first, discernment follows.</div>Observe Oneself? =

<span style="background-color:transparentBut you must begin when very small, and consciously, very consciously;coloryou must begin with a sense of observation of all the movements in yourself, of their relation with others, of—precisely, of your degree of independence, real individuality, of knowing where impulses come from, where other movements come from:#000000;">(The Motherwhether it is contagion from outside or something that arises from within yourself. A very profound study of all the movements in oneself is necessary in order to succeed simply in crystallising a being who is a little conscious, 27 January 1954)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>a little conscious. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/2722-januaryseptember-1954#p34p43</ref></u></span>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>For a larger mental being is there within us, a larger inner vital being, even a larger inner subtle-physical being other than our surface body-consciousness, and by entering into this or becoming it, identifying ourselves with it, we can observe the springs of our thoughts and feelings, the sources and motives of our action, the operative energies that build up our surface personality. For we discover and can know the inner being that secretly thinks and perceives in us, the vital being that secretly feels and acts upon life through us, the subtle-physical being that secretly receives and responds to the contacts of things through our body and its organs. Our surface thought, feeling, emotion is a complexity and confusion of impulsions from within and impacts from outside us; our reason, our organising intelligence can impose on it only an imperfect order: but here within we find the separate sources of our mental, our vital and our physical energisms and can see clearly the pure operations, the distinct powers, the composing elements of each and their interplay in a clear light of self-vision.~</div><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/knowledge-by-identity-and-separative-knowledge#p12</refcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>There is a state of being experienced in Yoga in which we become a double consciousness, one on the surface, small, active, ignorant, swayed by thoughts and feelings, grief and joy and all kinds of reactions, the other within calm, vast, equal, observing the surface being with an immovable detachment or indulgence or, it may be, acting upon its agitation to quiet, enlarge, transform it. So too we can rise to a consciousness above and observe the various parts of our being, inner and outer, mental, vital and physical and the subconscient below all, and act upon one or other or the whole from that higher status. It is possible also to go down from that height or from any height into any of these lower states and take its limited light or its obscurity as our place of working while the rest that we are is either temporarily put away or put behind or else kept as a field of reference from which we can get support, sanction or light and influence or as a status into which we can ascend or recede and from it observe the inferior movements. Or we can plunge into trance, get within ourselves and be conscious there while all outward things are excluded; or we can go beyond even this inner awareness and lose ourselves in some deeper other consciousness or some high superconscience. There is also a pervading equal consciousness into which we can enter and see all ourselves with one enveloping glance or omnipresent awareness one and indivisible.~</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/brahman-purusha-ishwara-maya-prakriti-shakti#p23</ref></u></divcenter>

== Witness If one begins to find out, to understand what a feeling is and Parts what a thought is, and how it works, then one can already go quite far on the path with that. One must at the same time observe how his feelings and thoughts have an action on the body, what the reciprocity is. And then, there is another exercise which consists in looking into oneself for what is persistent, what is lasting, something which makes one say "I", and which is not the body. For obviously, when one was very small, and then when each year one grows up, if one takes fairly long distances, for example a distance of Being ==about ten years, they are very different "I"s from what one was when as small as this (gesture), and then what one is now; it is difficult to say that it is the same person, you see. If one takes only this, still there is something which has the feeling of always being the same person. So one must reflect, seek, try to understand what it is. This indeed can lead you far on the path. Then if one also studies the relation between these different things—between thoughts, feelings, their action on the body, the reciprocal action of the body on these things—and also what it is that says "I" permanently, what it is that can trace a curve in the movement of the being, if one seeks carefully enough, it leads you quite far. Naturally if one seeks far enough and with enough persistence, one reaches the psychic. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/9-march-1955#p23</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>It is difficult to say generally what is conscious; but naturally, if something observes, it is always the "witness" element in this part—in each part of the being there is something which is a "witness", which looks on. There is even a physical witness which can get very much in the way; for instance, if it watches you playing, this can paralyse you considerably. There is also a vital witness which looks at you, sees your desires and enjoys highly all that happens; it acts also as a brake. There is the mental witness which judges ideas, which says, "This idea contradicts this other", and which arranges everything. Then there is the great psychic Witness, who is the inner divinity.~</divcenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The MotherIt is not a physical retirement that is needed, but an inner detachment from the mental formations and vital desires. To find the real self above and within and live in that, 22 March 1951)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>not in the mind's conceptions or the vital's reactions. These must be observed and looked at not as one's own but as movements of a surface ignorant nature. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/0431/22interactions-with-others-marchand-1951the-practice-of-yoga#p6p111</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>Sometimes there is no relation among these different witnesses—there ought to be, but it is not always there. But if there is in the being a will to become perfect, the relation is established quite quickly; one can refer to another and finally, if there is a sufficient sincerity, sufficient concentration, you come to the supreme inner Witness who can judge all things. But generally it may be said that it is always a part of the mind, more or less enlightened, in a little closer contact with the inner being, which observes and judges.~</spancenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The MotherWhen we are in contact with the Divine or in contact with an inner knowledge and vision, we begin to see all the circumstances of our life in a new light and can observe how they all tended without our knowing it towards the growth of our being and consciousness, towards the work we had to do, towards some development that had to be made,—not only what seemed good, fortunate or successful but the struggles, failures, difficulties, 22 March 1951)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>upheavals. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/0429/22the-marchdivine-1951grace-and-guidance#p7p33</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">A man with a very developed introspective mind often identifies himself with the witness part of his mind and observes his own thoughts and studies their nature. That is a beginning which makes it easy for the full detachment to come. For others it is less easy, but it can be done by all.</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/inner-detachment-and-the-witness-attitude#p</ref>= By Vigilance ==

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>You have to become conscious—that is to say, there must be something in you which is not carried away by thoughts and feelings, but looks at them and observes how they work and how they affect you. The part that observes and knows is called the Witness sākṣī in man. It is always possible to develop this in oneself.~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/inner-detachment-and-the-witness-attitude#p25</ref></u></spancenter>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>...behind there is the psychic which supports the development, the growth of the being and gives this continuity of consciousness, makes one feel that he is the same being even while being absolutely different, absolutely different. If later one observes himself sufficiently, he can see that the things he understood and could do at that time are things which seem to him absolutely inconceivable now, and that he could never do a similar thing because he is no longer that person at all. And yet, because within there was the psychic consciousness which is immortal, one has the feeling that it is always the same being which was there and continues to be there and will continue to be there with more or less progressive and more or less conscious changes.~</div><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother, 29 June 1955)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/29-june-1955#p28</ref></u></spancenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">The ordinary mind knows itself only as an ego with all the movements But a time comes when instead of the nature in doing things automatically, impelled by a jumble consciousness andforce of which one is quite unaware—a time comes when one can observe what goes on in oneself, identifying itself with these study one's movements, thinks "I am doing thisfind their causes, feeling thatand at the same time begin to exercise a control first over what goes on within us, thinkingthen on the influence cast on us from outside which makes us act, in joy or in sorrow etc." The first the beginning of real self-knowledge is when you feel yourself separate from altogether unconsciously and almost involuntarily, but gradually more and more consciously; and the nature in you will can wake up and its movements and then you see react. Then at that moment, the moment there are many parts is a conscious will capable of your beingreacting, one may say, many personalities each acting on its own behalf "I have become conscious." This does not mean that it is a total and in its own way. The two different beings you feel are—oneperfect consciousness, the psychic being which draws you towards the Motherit means that it is a beginning: for example, when one is able to observe all the other the external reactions in one's being mostly vital which draws you outward and downwards towards the play to have a certain control over them, to let those one approves of the lower nature. There is also in you behind the mind the being who observes, the witness Purusha, who can stand detached from the have play of the nature, observing it and able to choosecontrol, stop, annul those one doesn't approve of.</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/08/28/the-psychicnovember-being1956#p84p19</ref></u></div>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>The actions are of importance only as expressing what is in the nature. You have to be conscious of whatever in your actions is not in harmony with the Yoga and to get rid of it. But for that what is needed is your own consciousness, the psychic, observing from within and throwing off what is seen to be undesirable.~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/work-and-yoga#p45</ref></u></spancenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">The mental being within watchesTake one hour of your life, the one which is most convenient for you, observes and passes judgment on all during that happens in you. The psychic does not watch and time observe in this way like a witness, but it feels and knows spontaneously in a much more direct and luminous way by the very purity of its own nature and the divine instinct within it, yourself closely and so, whenever it comes to say only the front it reveals at once what are the right and what the wrong movements in your natureabsolutely indispensable words.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2803/the-jivatman-in-the-integral-yogaanger#p40p15</ref></u></span>

== By Developing a Quiet Mind and Self-Observation ==

<div style="color:#000000;">Gradually, as the action It is prolonged and only when we follow the outer being begins to assimilate this action, there awakens a capacity yogic process of observation, first in quieting the mental consciousness, and mind itself that a kind profounder result of objectivisation occursour self-observation becomes possible. <ref>http: something in the mind looks on, observes and translates in its own way. This is what you call understanding, and this is what gives you the impression (smiling) that you are having an experience//incarnateword. But that is already considerably diminished in comparison with the experience itself, it is a transcription adapted to your mental, vital /cwsa/21/indeterminates-cosmic-determinations-and physical dimension, that is, something that is shrunken, hardened—and it gives you at -the same time the impression that it is growing clearer; that is to say, it has become as limited as your understanding.-indeterminable#p12</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>(The Mother, 31 October 1956)~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/31-october-1956#p19</ref></u></spancenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">...We have in A quiet mind does not mean that there will be no thoughts or mental movements at all functionings of the mentality four elements, the object of mental consciousness, the act of mental consciousness, but that these will be on the occasion surface and the subject. In the self-experience of the self-observing inner you will feel your true beingwithin separate from them, the object is always some state or movement or wave of the conscious beingobserving but not carried away, anger, grief or other emotion, hunger or other vital craving, impulse or inner life reaction or some form of sensation, perception or thought activity. The act is some kind of mental observation able to watch and conceptual valuation of this movement or wave or else a mental sensation of it in which observation judge them and valuation may reject all that has to be involved rejected and to accept and even lost,—so keep to all that in this act the mental person may either separate the act is true consciousness and the object by a distinguishing perception or confuse them together indistinguishablytrue experience. <ref>http://incarnateword. in/cwsa/29/peace#p10</spanref>

<div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/memory-ego-and-self-experience#p5</ref></ucenter>~</divcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">So the man of real merit or the more civilised man has a whole mental construction to There are four movements which are usually consecutive, but which he must conform in order the end may be simultaneous: to be in harmony with observe one's thoughts is the ideal of the environment in which he lives. But someone who does not conform at least first, to watch over one's thoughts is the smallest part of this construction would be considered a savage and would be thrown out of the society immediately. In factsecond, people who are criminals or half-mad are those who obey their impulses without any mental to control. There isnone't a single person among you who gives way without control s thoughts is the third and to all master one's thoughts is the impulses that get hold of himfourth. You have only to To observe yourselves living, you spend your time sayingto watch over, "Noto control, this I can't do", or "This I can", or in restraining one movement or encouraging anotherto master. This is mental control<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/conjugate-verses#p7</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>(The Mother , 15 September 1954)~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/15-september-1954#p9</ref></u></spancenter>

== Vital What happens usually is that something touches the vital, often without one's knowing it, and Selfbrings up the old ordinary or external consciousness in such a way that the inner mind gets covered up and all the old thoughts and feelings return for a time. It is the physical mind that becomes active and gives its assent. If the whole mind remains quiet and detached observing the vital movement, but not giving its assent, then to reject it becomes more easy. This established quietude and detachment of the mind marks always a great step forward made in the sadhana. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/the-vital-and-other-levels-of-Observation ==being#p45</ref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>What happens usually is that something touches the vital, often without one's knowing it, and brings up the old ordinary or external consciousness in such a way that the inner mind gets covered up and all the old thoughts and feelings return for a time. It is the physical mind that becomes active and gives its assent. If the whole mind remains quiet and detached observing the vital movement, but not giving its assent, then to reject it becomes more easy. This established quietude and detachment of the mind marks always a great ~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">step forward made in the sadhana.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/the-vital-and-other-levels-of-being#p45</ref></u></spancenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>After each crisis there is something gained, if there has been a victory and rejection. The gain is to externalise the vital disturbance, so that even if it returns it will be felt so much an outside force that the observing consciousness (mental, higher vital) cannot be disturbed. If you keep that, it will be an immense advance.~</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/wrong-movements-of-the-vital#p68</refcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">One can prepare You must be able to silence your head absolutely and be completely detached, not to have (for example, when you are looking for the body through a series solution of observations, studies, understandings,by showing it examples, making it understand things as one makes a child understand them, either by observing its own movements―but generallyproblem), not to have already in thisyour head the solution that seems to you right or the best or most profitable. That must not be there. You must become absolutely like a blank paper, one is comparatively blind!―or by observing those of otherswith nothing on it. And you proceed in that way, with a more general wayvery sincere aspiration to know the truth, this preparation without assuming beforehand that it will be based on recognised studies, on clear facts. Like like this, for instance: or like that a certain number of persons, placed in exactly similar circumstances, experience, each one of them, ; because otherwise you will see only your own formation. The very different effects. One may go even further: in a given set of definite circumstances, there first condition is a certain number of particular, definite individuals, in apparently quite identical conditions, and for some that the head must keep completely silent during the effects are catastrophic, while others escape without any harmtime one is observing.</div><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother, 4 July 1956)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0805/430-julyseptember-19561953#p15p13</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>If it is an inert tamasic passivity subject to any influence and unable to react, then it is subjection to Nature. If it is a sattwic passivity of the Witness observing and understanding the movements of Nature, then it is an intermediate condition, often necessary for knowledge. If it is a luminous passivity open to the Divine, shut to all other influences, then it is not subjection to Nature but surrender to the Divine.~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/difficulties-of-the-physical-nature#p24</ref></u></spancenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">For To silence the giddinessmind it is not enough to throw back each thought as it comes, it may that can only be that in concentration you go partly out of your body; then, if you a subordinate movement. One must get up back from all thought and move before be separate from it, a silent consciousness observing the whole consciousness has thoughts if they come back, there is just such a giddiness but not oneself thinking or identified with the thoughts. Thoughts must be felt as you describeoutside things altogether. You can observe in future and see whether it It is not this that happens. One has to be careful not then easier to move after deep concentration reject thoughts or trance, till there is let them pass without their disturbing the full consciousness in quietude of the bodymind.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/difficultiesinteractions-with-others-ofand-the-physicalpractice-natureof-yoga#p59p99</ref></u></span>

= Consciousness and Self-Observation = By Developing the Witness Attitude ==

<div style="color:#000000;">Your consciousness becomes Have you never felt this? As though you were a screen little behind or mirror; above things, and were looking at them taking place but this were not doing anything yourself? Witness means an observer, someone who looks on and does not act himself. So, when the mind is when you are very quiet, one can withdraw a little in this way from circumstances and look at things as though he were a state of contemplationwitness, a mere observer; when spectator, and not participating in the action himself. This gives you are activea great detachment, a great quietude, and also a very precise sense of the value of things, because it is like a searchlightcuts the attachment to action. You have only When you know how to turn it ondo this with yourself, when you can withdraw and watch yourself acting, if you want to see luminously learn many things about yourself. When you are all mixed up and examine penetratingly anything take part in any placethe action, you do not observe yourself acting, you don't know what you are like. But when you draw back and look at yourself, you can perceive many imperfections which you wouldn't have seen otherwise. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/13-october-1954#p2</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>(The Mother, 30 June 1929)~</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/30-june-1929#p7</refcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>However, if one observes things a little deeply, one perceives that there is progress, that things become better and better, though apparently they do not improve. And for a consciousness seated a little higher, it is quite evident that all evil—at least what we call evil—all falsehood, all that is contrary to the Truth, all suffering, all opposition is the result of a disequilibrium. I believe that one who is habituated to seeing things from this higher plane sees immediately that it is like that. ~</div><div style="color:#000000;">(The Mother , 8 January 1951)</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/8-january-1951#p13</ref></u></divcenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">There are two centres or parts of the consciousness—one You have to become conscious—that is a witnessto say, sākṣīthere must be something in you which is not carried away by thoughts and feelings, but looks at them and observes, the other consciousness is active how they work and it is this active consciousness that how they affect you felt going down deep into the vital being. If your mind had not become active, you would have known where it went The part that observes and what it went there to experience or doknows is called the Witness sākṣī in man. When there It is an experience, you should not begin always possible to think about it, for that is of no use at all and it only stops the experience—you should remain silent, observe and let it go on to its enddevelop this in oneself.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/suggestionsinner-fordetachment-dealingand-withthe-experienceswitness-attitude#p8p25</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">At For that you must be absolutely sincere and impartial. You must observe yourself as if you were observing and criticising a certain stage of the sadhanathird person. You must not start with an idea that this is your life's mission, this is your particular capacity, this you are to do or that you are to do, in this lies your talent or genius, etc. That will carry you away from the beginning (right track. It is not the liking or near it) disliking of the more intense experiencesyour external being, it sometimes happens your mental or vital or physical choice that there is determines the intense realisation of some aspect true line of your growth. Nor should you take up the Divineopposite attitude and say, a sort of communion with it"I am good for nothing in this matter, and I am useless in that one; it is seen everywhere not for me." Neither vanity and all as thatarrogance nor self-depreciation and false modesty should move you. It is a transitory phase As I said, you must be absolutely impartial and afterwards one gets the larger experience of the Divine in all its aspects and beyond all aspectsunconcerned. Throughout the experience there You should be one part of like a mirror that reflects the being that observes and understands—for sometimes ignorant sadhaks are carried away by their experience truth and stop short there or fall into extravagancedoes not judge. It must be taken as an experience through which you are passing.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/3015/suggestions-for12-dealingnovember-with-experiences1952#p10p6</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">Thoughts are not the essence of mind-beingIf you observe yourself, they are only an activity of mental nature; if you will see that activity ceases, what appears then as soon as you do something which disturbs you a thought-free existence that manifests in its place is not a blank or void but something very reallittle, substantial, concrete we may say—a mental being that extends itself widely and can be its own field of existence silent or active as well as the Witness, Knower, Master mind immediately gives you a favourable reason to justify yourself—this mind is capable of that field and its actiongilding everything. Some feel In these conditions it first as a void, but that is because their observation is untrained difficult to know oneself. One must be absolutely sincere to be able to do it and insufficient and loss of activity gives them to see clearly into all the sense of blank; an emptiness there is, but it is an emptiness little falsehoods of the ordinary activities, not a blank of existencemental being.</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/3004/three-experiences-of-the15-innerjanuary-being1951#p3</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">It is only gradually, very slowly, through the movements =By Becoming Aware of life and a more or less careful and thorough education that you begin to have sensations which are personal to you, feelings and ideas which are personal to you. An individualised mind is something extremely rare, which comes only after a long education; otherwise it is a kind of thought-current passing through your brain and then through another's and then through a multitude of other brains, and all this is in perpetual movement and has no individuality. One thinks what others are thinking, others think what still others are thinking, and everybody thinks like that in a great mixture, because these are currents, vibrations of thought passing from one to another. If you look at yourself attentively, you will very quickly become aware that very few thoughts in you are personal. Where do you draw them from?—From what you have heard, from what you have read, what you have been taught, and how many of these thoughts you have are the result of your own experience, your own reflection, your purely personal observation?—Not many.</div>Desire ==

<span style=For that you must observe yourself very, very attentively, and if there is anything in you which produces something like a small intense vibration, then you may be sure that there lies a desire. For example, you say, "This food is necessary for me"—you believe, you imagine, you think that you need such and such a thing and you find the necessary means to obtain the thing. To know if it is a need or a desire, you must look at yourself very closely and ask yourself, "What will happen if I cannot get the thing?" Then if the immediate answer is, "Oh, it will be very bad", you may be sure that it is a matter of desire. It is the same for everything. For every problem you draw back, look at yourself and ask, "background-color:transparent;color:#000000;Let us see, am I going to have the thing?">(The MotherIf at that moment something in you jumps up with joy, you may be certain there is a desire. On the other hand, if something tells you, 20 February 1957)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;Oh, I am not going to get it"><u>, and you feel very depressed, then again it is a desire. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0904/2025-februaryjanuary-19571951#p6p3</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>To observe your thoughts, you must first of all separate yourself from them. In the ordinary state, the ordinary man does not distinguish himself from his thoughts. He does not even know that he thinks. He thinks by habit. And if he is asked all of a sudden, "What are you thinking of?", he knows nothing about it. That is to say, ninety-five times out of a hundred he will answer, "I do not know." There is a complete identification between the movement of thought and the consciousness of the being.~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/conjugate-verses#p12</ref></u></spancenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">...when undesirable thoughts come, if If you look at them, observe themyourself attentively, if you take pleasure in following them in their movementswill see that before acting you need an inner impetus, they will never stop comingsomething which pushes you. It In the ordinary man this impetus is the same thing when you have undesirable feelings or sensation: if you pay attention generally desire. This desire ought to them, concentrate on them or even look at them with be replaced by a certain indulgenceclear, they will never stop. But if you absolutely refuse to receive and express themprecise, after some time they stopconstant vision of the Truth. You must be patient and very persistent<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/21-december-1950#p7</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother , 22 September 1954)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/22-september-1954#p19</ref></u></span>By Education of the Senses==

<div style="color:#000000;"center>Most people—and not only those who are uneducated but even the well-read—can have the most contradictory, the most opposite ideas in their heads without even being aware of the contradictions….And if you observe yourself, you will see that you have many ideas which ought to be linked by a sequence of intermediate ideas which are the result of a considerable widening of the thought if they are not to coexist in an absurd way.~</divcenter><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother, 20 February 1957)</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/20-february-1957#p8</ref>  <div style="color:#000000;">The error comes from thinking that your thoughts are your own and that you are their maker and if you don't create thoughts (i.e. think), there will be none. A little observation ought to show that you are not manufacturing your own thoughts, but rather thoughts occur in you.</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/thought-and-knowledge#p3</ref></u></div> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">When one practises Yoga and observes the thoughts, one sees that they come from outside, from universal Nature, from the mental, vital or subtle physical worlds etc. The proper thing is then to stand back from these thoughts, voices or suggestions, to reject them or else control them, to make the mind free and quiet and open only to the divine light, force, knowledge and the presence of the Divine….Aspire, get into contact with the Light and the true Force, reassert your will to reject these suggestions and voices. Do not take interest in these voices, keep the mind quiet.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/thought-and-knowledge#p5</ref></u></span> = Sense and Self Observation = <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">This sensational thought-mind which is based upon sense, memory, association, first ideas and resultant generalisations or secondary ideas, is common to all developed animal life and mentality….The intelligence and will of the animal are involved in the sense-mind and therefore altogether governed by it and carried on its stream of sensations, sense-perceptions, impulses; it is instinctive. Man is able to use a reason and will, a self-observing, thinking and all-observing, an intelligently willing mind which is no longer involved in the sense-mind, but acts from above and behind it in its own right, with a certain separateness and freedom. He is reflective, has a certain relative freedom of intelligent will. He has liberated in himself and has formed into a separate power the buddhi.</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/purification-intelligence-and-will#p4</ref> 

<div style="color:#000000;">….But it is through sensations that you learn: by seeingThe child must be taught to observe, observing, hearing. Classes develop your sensations, studies develop your sensations, the mind receives things through sensations. By the education of the senses the growth of one's general education is aided; if you learn to see wellnote his reactions and impulses and their causes, exactly, precisely; if you learn to hear well; if you learn through touch to know the nature of things; if you learn through the see of smell to distinguish between different odours—all these are become a powerful means discerning witness of education. In facthis desires, they should be used for this, as instruments his movements of observation, control violence and knowledge. If one is sufficiently developedpassion, one can know the nature his instincts of things through sight; through possession and appropriation and domination and the see background of smell one may also know the valuevanity which supports them, the different nature together with their counterparts of things; by touch one can recognise things. It is a question of education; that isweakness, discouragement, one must work for itdepression and despair.</div><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother , 31 March 1954)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0612/31vital-march-1954education#p13p14</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">The indispensable starting-point is a detailed and discerning observation of the character to be transformed. In most cases, that itself is a difficult and often a very baffling task. But </span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">there is one fact which the old traditions knew and which can serve as the clue in the labyrinth of inner discovery. It is that everyone possesses in a large measure, and the exceptional individual in an increasing degree of precision, two opposite tendencies of character, in almost equal proportions, which are like the light and the shadow of the same thing. Thus someone who has the capacity of being exceptionally generous will suddenly find an obstinate avarice rising up in his nature, the courageous man will be a coward in some part of his being and the good man will suddenly have wicked impulses. In this way life seems to endow everyone not only with the possibility of expressing an ideal, but also with contrary elements representing in a concrete manner the battle he has to wage and the victory he has to win for the realisation to become possible. Consequently, all life is an education pursued more or less consciously, more or less willingly. In certain cases this education will encourage the movements that express the light, in others, on the contrary, those that express the shadow. If the circumstances and the environment are favourable, the light will grow at the expense of the shadow; otherwise the opposite will happen. And in this way the individual's character will crystallise according to the whims of Nature and the determinisms of material and vital life, unless a higher element comes in in time, a conscious will which, refusing to allow Nature to follow her whimsical ways, will replace them by a logical and clear-sighted discipline. This conscious will is what we mean by a rational method of education.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/12/vital-education#p6</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">..The child must be taught = How to observe, to note his reactions and impulses and their causes, to become a discerning witness of his desires, his movements of violence and passion, his instincts of possession and appropriation and domination and the background of vanity which supports them, together with their counterparts of weakness, discouragement, depression and despair.</span><span styleObserve Thoughts=="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/12/vital-education#p14</ref></u></span>

= Results of SelfThe error comes from thinking that your thoughts are your own and that you are their maker and if you don't create thoughts (i.e. think), there will be none. A little observation ought to show that you are not manufacturing your own thoughts, but rather thoughts occur in you. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/thought-Observation =and-knowledge#p3</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>If you observe yourself attentively, you will see that before acting you need an inner impetus, something which pushes you. In the ordinary man this impetus is generally desire. This desire ought to be replaced by a clear, precise, constant vision of the Truth.~</div><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother , 21 December 1950)</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/21-december-1950#p7</refcenter>

<div style="color:#000000Thoughts are not the essence of mind-being, they are only an activity of mental nature;">If you observe yourselfif that activity ceases, what appears then as a thought-free existence that manifests in its place is not a blank or void but something very real, substantial, you will see concrete we may say—a mental being that extends itself widely and can be its own field of existence silent or active as soon well as you do something which disturbs you a littlethe Witness, Knower, the mind immediately gives you a favourable reason to justify yourself—this mind is capable Master of gilding everythingthat field and its action. In these conditions Some feel it first as a void, but that is because their observation is difficult to know oneself. One must be absolutely sincere to be able to do it untrained and insufficient and to see clearly into all loss of activity gives them the little falsehoods sense of blank; an emptiness there is, but it is an emptiness of the mental beingordinary activities, not a blank of existence.</div><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother, 15 January 1951)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/0430/15three-januaryexperiences-1951of-the-inner-being#p3</ref></u></span>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>… if each element which comes with its ignorance, its unconsciousness, its egoism, is put before the will to change and one remains awake, compares, observes, studies and slowly acts, that becomes infinitely interesting, one makes marvellous and quite unexpected discoveries. One finds in oneself lots of small hidden folds, little things one had not seen at the beginning; one undertakes a sort of inner chase, goes hunting into small dark corners and tells oneself: "What, I was like that! This was there in me, I am harbouring this little thing"—sometimes so sordid, so mean, so nasty. And once it has been discovered, how wonderful! One puts the light upon it and it disappears and you no longer have those reactions which made you so sad before, when you used to say, "Oh! I shall never get there.~</div><div style="color:#000000;">(The Mother, 19 April 1951)</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/19-april-1951#p14</ref></u></divcenter>

= Difficulties during SelfIt is only gradually, very slowly, through the movements of life and a more or less careful and thorough education that you begin to have sensations which are personal to you, feelings and ideas which are personal to you. An individualised mind is something extremely rare, which comes only after a long education; otherwise it is a kind of thought-Observation =current passing through your brain and then through another's and then through a multitude of other brains, and all this is in perpetual movement and has no individuality. One thinks what others are thinking, others think what still others are thinking, and everybody thinks like that in a great mixture, because these are currents, vibrations of thought passing from one to another. If you look at yourself attentively, you will very quickly become aware that very few thoughts in you are personal. Where do you draw them from?—From what you have heard, from what you have read, what you have been taught, and how many of these thoughts you have are the result of your own experience, your own reflection, your purely personal observation?—Not many. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/20-february-1957#p6</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">But to begin with, how many times, if When one thinks, if one quite simply practises Yoga and observes oneself, does one catch oneself saying, "It is I!" And, then, one congratulates oneself sometimesthe thoughts, one says, "After all I can do something, I am capable!" I am going further: how many people would be capable of doing anything at all if simply deprived of the pleasure of being able to tell themselves, "I have done this, I have realised sees thatthey come from outside, I have made a progressfrom universal Nature, how well I played this game"? How many people would be able to sincerely do something if this pleasure were taken away? I have known individuals whose mind was much more developed than the rest of from the beingmental, they had understood very well (almost too well); they sat down vital or subtle physical worlds etc. The proper thing is then to meditate and all their energy was gonestand back from these thoughts, all vitality evaporated into a kind of peace, not unpleasantvoices or suggestions, but very still. There is no more need to do anythingreject them or else control them, no longer any need to move, one dreams.... Under a tree, arms crossed, one leaves make the Divine mind free and quiet and open only to do everything for oneselfthe divine light, including feeding you if you need it. This is perhaps very wellforce, but this shows that knowledge and the instrument is not ready; it is not really at the service presence of the Divine. ...Aspire, it is at get into contact with the service of Light and the egotrue Force, reassert your will to reject these suggestions and when the ego is taken away, it does nothing any longervoices. ThereforeDo not take interest in these voices, so long as one lives in the ego this illusion is necessary to make you act; it is necessary to keep up action until one is completely transformed or, in any case, till the true consciousness is establishedmind quiet. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/thought-and-knowledge#p5</divref>

<span style="backgroundDifficulties in Self-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother ,5 April 1951)</span><span styleObservation="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/5-april-1951#p14</ref></u></span>

<div style="color:#000000;">...if you do your tapasya, all =Danger of the time observing yourself doing it and telling yourself, "Am I making any progress, is this going to be better, am I going to succeed?", then it is your ego, you know, which becomes more and more enormous and occupies the whole place, and there is no room for anything else. </div>Ego==

<div style=But to begin with, how many times, if one thinks, if one quite simply observes oneself, does one catch oneself saying, "It is I!" And, then, one congratulates oneself sometimes, one says, "After all I can do something, I am capable!"colorI am going further:#000000how many people would be capable of doing anything at all if simply deprived of the pleasure of being able to tell themselves, "I have done this, I have realised that, I have made a progress, how well I played this game"? How many people would be able to sincerely do something if this pleasure were taken away? I have known individuals whose mind was much more developed than the rest of the being, they had understood very well (almost too well); they sat down to meditate and all their energy was gone, all vitality evaporated into a kind of peace, not unpleasant, but very still. There is no more need to do anything, no longer any need to move, one dreams. ...Under a tree, arms crossed, one leaves the Divine to do everything for oneself, including feeding you if you need it. This is perhaps very well, but this shows that the instrument is not ready; it is not really at the service of the Divine, it is at the service of the ego, and when the ego is taken away, it does nothing any longer. Therefore, so long as one lives in the ego this illusion is necessary to make you act;">it is necessary to keep up action until one is completely transformed or, in any case, till the true consciousness is established. (The Mother , 26 5 April 1951)<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/5-april-1951#p14</divref>

<refcenter>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/26-april-1951#p35~</refcenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">Do not be over-eager for experience,—for experiences you can always get, having once broken the barrier between the physical mind and the subtle planes. What you have to aspire for most is the improved quality of the recipient consciousness in you—discrimination in the mind, the unattached impersonal Witness look on all that goes on in you and around you, purity in the vital, calm equanimity, enduring patience, absence of pride and the sense of greatness—and more especially, the development of the psychic being in you—surrender, self-giving, psychic humility, devotion... a sufficient foundation and a consciousness always self-observant, vigilant and growing in these things is indispensable—for perfect purification is the basis of the perfect siddhi.</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/the-danger-of-the-ego-and-the-need-of-purification#p14</ref>= Escape attitude ==

== <span style="background-colorConstantly man rushes into external action in order not to have time to observe himself and how he lives. For him this is expressed by the desire to escape from boredom. Indeed, for some people it is much more tiresome to remain quiet—seated, or to be still. So for them it represents an escape from boredom:transparentto make a lot of noise, to commit many stupidities, and become terribly restless;colorit is their way of escaping boredom. And when they sit quietly and look at themselves, they are bored. Perhaps because they are boring. That's very likely. The more boring one is, the more one is bored. Very interesting people usually are not bored. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/26-january-1955#000000;">Escape attitudep14</spanref> ==

<div style="color:#000000;">Constantly man rushes into external action in order not to have time to observe himself and how he lives. For him this is expressed by the desire to escape from boredom. Indeed, for some people it is much more tiresome to remain quiet—seated, or to be still. So for them it represents an escape from boredom: to make a lot of noise, to commit many stupidities, and become terribly restless; it is their way of escaping boredom. And when they sit quietly and look at themselves, they are bored. Perhaps because they are boring. That's very likely. The more boring one is, =Focusing on the more one is bored. Very interesting people usually are not bored.</div><span styleNegative="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother , 26 January 1955)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/26-january-1955#p14</ref></u></span>

== Focusing on To be always observing faults and wrong movements brings depression and discourages the Negative ==faith. Turn your eyes more to the coming Light and less to any immediate darkness. Faith, cheerfulness, confidence in the ultimate victory are the things that help,—they make the progress easier and swifter. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/steps-towards-overcoming-difficulties#p28</ref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>To be always observing faults and wrong movements brings depression and discourages the faith. Turn your eyes more to the coming Light and less to any immediate darkness. Faith, cheerfulness, confidence in the ultimate victory are the things that help,—they make the progress easier and swifter.~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/steps-towards-overcoming-difficulties#p28</ref></u></spancenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">It What you have to aspire for most is a subtle law the improved quality of the action of recipient consciousness in you—discrimination in the mind, the unattached impersonal Witness look on all that if goes on in you and around you stress difficulties—you have to observe them, of coursepurity in the vital, but not stress themcalm equanimity, they will quite sufficiently do that for themselves—the difficulties tend to stick or even increase; on the contraryenduring patience, if you put your whole stress on faith absence of pride and aspiration and concentrate steadily on what you aspire tothe sense of greatness—and more especially, that will sooner or later tend towards realisation. It is this change the development of stressthe psychic being in you—surrender, self-giving, psychic humility, devotion... a sufficient foundation and a change consciousness always self-observant, vigilant and growing in these things is indispensable—for perfect purification is the poise and attitude basis of the mind, that will be the more helpful processperfect siddhi.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/3130/dealingthe-danger-of-withthe-depressionego-and-despondencythe-need-of-purification#p22p14</ref></u></span>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>It is difficult to observe the difference between the action of the hostile Force and the pressure of the lower Nature because it is the latter that the Force takes hold of for its purpose. But there is in the Force a suggestive character, a conscious arrangement of the attack so as to upset or destroy the sadhana which there is not in the ordinary movement of the lower Nature—for that only comes to satisfy itself and then ceases.~</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/the-hostile-forces-and-the-difficulties-of-yoga#p35</ref></u></divcenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>If you had that observation (from the inner spiritual, not the outer intellectual and ethical viewpoint), then it would be comparatively easy for you to get out of your difficulties; for instance you would find at once where this irrational impulse to flee away came from and it would not have any hold upon you. Of course, all that can only be done to the best effect when you stand back from the play of your nature and become the Witness-Control or the Spectator-Actor Manager. But that is what happens when you take this kind of self-seeing posture.~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/mental-difficulties-and-the-need-of-quietude#p23</ref></u></spancenter>

= Other fields of SelfDespair and despondency are always wrong. If you make a mistake, quietly observe it and correct the tendency next time. Even if the mistake recurs often, you have only to persevere quietly—remembering that nature cannot be changed in a day. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/depression-Observation =and-despondency#p67</ref>

== Meditation Surface Level Observation==

<div style="color:#000000;">... when one comes out of meditation, some time later—usually not immediately—from within the being something new emerges in the consciousness: As a new understandinggeneral rule, with a new appreciation of thingsfew very rare exceptions, a new attitude in life—in short, a new way of being. This may be fugitive, but at men are content to observe more or less accurately everything that momenthappens around them, if one observes itand sometimes within themselves, and to classify all these observations according to one finds that something has taken one step forward on the path superficial system of understanding logic or transformationanother. And they call this organisation, these systems, "knowledge". It may be an illuminationhas never occurred to them, an understanding truer or closer they have not even begun to perceive that all the truththings they see, or a power of transformation which helps you to achieve a psychological progress or a widening of the consciousness or a greater control over your movementstouch, feel, experience, over the activities of the beingare false appearances and not reality itself.</div>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000[Based on Aphorism 7—What men call knowledge is the reasoned acceptance of false appearances. Wisdom looks behind the veil and sees. Reason divides, fixes details and contrasts them;">(The Mother Wisdom unifies, 5 June 1957)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>marries contrasts in a single harmony].<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0910/5-juneaphorism-19577#p20p3</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>The mind is always in activity, but we do not observe fully what it is doing, but allow ourselves to be carried away in the stream of continual thinking. When we try to concentrate, this stream of self-moved mechanical thinking becomes prominent to our observation. It is the first normal obstacle (the other is sleep during meditation) to the effort towards Yoga.~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/concentration-and-meditation#p30</ref></u></spancenter>

== <span style="background-color:transparentOne throws oneself out all the time;color:#000000;">(The Mother all the time one lives, as it were, outside oneself, in such a superficial sensation that it is almost as though one were outside oneself. As soon as one wants even to observe oneself a little, control oneself a little, simply know what is happening, one is always obliged to draw back or pull towards oneself, to pull inwards something which is constantly like that, on the surface. And it is this surface thing which meets all external contacts, 21 April 1929)</span>puts you in touch with similar vibrations coming from others. That happens almost outside you. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0308/2120-apriljune-19291956#p6p49</ref>

<div style="color:#000000If we observe a happening, we judge and explain it from the result and from a glimpse of its most external constituents, circumstances or causes;">It but each happening is the outcome of a tremendous field complex nexus of observation—there is no end forces which we do not and cannot observe, because all forces are to us invisible,—but they are not invisible to the discoveries you can make in your dreams. But there is one important pointspiritual vision of the Infinite: you must not go some of them are actualities working to sleep when you produce or occasion a new actuality, some are very tired, for if you do, you fall into possibles that are near to the pre-existent actuals and in a sort of unconsciousness way included in which dreams do whatever they like with youtheir aggregate; but there can intervene always new possibilities that suddenly become dynamic potentials and add themselves to the nexus, and you have no reaction. Just as I said that you should not eat without having taken rest, I would advise everyone to rest before going behind all are imperatives or an imperative which these possibilities are labouring to sleepactualise. And for that, you must know how to rest<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/brahman-purusha-ishwara-maya-prakriti-shakti#p7</divref>

<span style="backgroundSelf Observation -color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother , 1 February 1951)</span><span styleExploring Realms of Consciousness="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/15/1-february-1951#p14</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparentMan is a type among many types so constructed, one pattern among the multitude of patterns in the manifestation in Matter. He is the most complex that has been created, the richest in content of consciousness and the curious ingeniousness of his building;color:#000000;">As he is the head of the inner consciousness grows by sadhanaearthly creation, but he does not exceed it…. If there is a perfection to which he has to arrive, these dream experiences increase it must be a perfection in numberhis own kind, clearnesswithin his own law of being, coherence—the full play of it, accuracy and after some growth but by observation of experience its mode and consciousnessmeasure, we can, if we observenot by transcendence. To exceed himself, come to understand them and their significance to our inner life. Even we can by training become so conscious as to follow our own passagegrow into the superman, usually veiled to our awareness and memory, through many realms put on the nature and the process capacities of the return to the waking state. At a certain pitch of this inner wakefulness this kind of sleep, god would be a sleep contradiction of experienceshis self-law, can replace the ordinary subconscient slumberimpracticable and impossible.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/3022/threeman-experiences-ofand-the-inner-beingevolution#p6p8</ref></u></span>

<div style="color:#000000;">If one begins to find out, to understand what a feeling is and what a thought is, and how it works, then one can already go quite far on the path with that. One must at the same time observe how his feelings and thoughts have an action on the body, what the reciprocity is. And then, .behind there is another exercise the psychic which consists in looking into oneself for what is persistentsupports the development, what is lastingthe growth of the being and gives this continuity of consciousness, something which makes one say "I", and which feel that he is not the bodysame being even while being absolutely different, absolutely different. For obviously, when If later one was very smallobserves himself sufficiently, he can see that the things he understood and then when each year one grows up, if one takes fairly long distances, for example a distance of about ten years, they could do at that time are very different "I"s from what one was when as small as this (gesture)things which seem to him absolutely inconceivable now, and then what one that he could never do a similar thing because he is now; it is difficult to say no longer that it is the same person, you seeat all. If one takes only thisAnd yet, still because within there was the psychic consciousness which is something which immortal, one has the feeling of always being the same person. So one must reflect, seek, try to understand what it is. This indeed can lead you far on the path. Then if one also studies the relation between these different things—between thoughts, feelings, their action on the body, the reciprocal action of the body on these things—and also what it is that says "I" permanently, what it is that can trace a curve in the movement of always the same being, if one seeks carefully enough, it leads you quite far. Naturally if one seeks far enough which was there and continues to be there and will continue to be there with enough persistence, one reaches the psychicmore or less progressive and more or less conscious changes. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/29-june-1955#p28</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>(The Mother, 9 March 1955)~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/9-march-1955#p23</ref></u></spancenter>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>A hidden Power is the true Lord and overruling Observer of our acts and only he knows through all the ignorance and perversion and deformation brought in by the ego their entire sense and ultimate purpose.~</divcenter>

<div style="color:#0066ccThe Shakti, the power of the Infinite and the Eternal descends within us, works, breaks up our present psychological formations, shatters every wall, widens, liberates... she frees the consciousness from confinement in the body; it can go out in trance or sleep or even waking and enter into worlds or other regions of this world and act there or carry back its experience. It spreads out, feeling the body only as a small part of itself, and begins to contain what before contained it;it achieves the cosmic consciousness and extends itself to be commensurate with the universe. It begins to know inwardly and directly and not merely by external observation and contact the forces at play in the world, feels their movement, distinguishes their functioning and can operate immediately upon them as the scientist operates upon physical forces, accept their action and results in our mind, life, body or reject them or modify, change, reshape, create immense new powers and movements in place of the old small functionings of the nature. We begin to perceive the working of the forces of universal Mind and to know how our thoughts are created by that working...."><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2308/self-surrender7-innovember-works-the-way-of-the-gita1956#p6p1</ref></u></div>

<div style="color:#000000;">It is ordinarily considered thus by an integralisation of our divided being that the Yogin should draw away from action as Divine Shakti in the Yoga will proceed to its object; for liberation, perfection, mastery are dependent on this integralisation, since the little wave on the surface cannot control its own movement, much as possible and especially that too much action is a hindrance because less have any true control over the vast life around it draws off the energies outward. To a certain extent this is true; ..It begins to know inwardly and directly and not merely by external observation and we must note farther that when contact the mental Purusha takes up forces at play in the attitude of mere witness and observer, a tendency to silenceworld, solitudefeels their movement, physical calm distinguishes their functioning and bodily inaction grows can operate immediately upon them as the being. So long as this is not associated with inertiascientist operates upon physical forces, accept their action and results in our mind, life, incapacity body or reject them or unwillingness to actmodify, change, reshape, create immense new powers and movements in a word, with place of the growth old small functionings of the tamasic quality, all this is to the goodnature.</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the-releaseascent-fromof-subjection-tothe-thesacrifice-bodyii#p7p29</ref></u></div>

<div style="color:#000000;">It is possible for the Purusha =How to use it on the mental plane itself for be in a constant self-observation, self-development, self-modification, to sanction, reject, alter, bring out new formulations of the nature and establish a calm and disinterested action, a high and pure sattwic balance and rhythm of its energy, a personality perfected in the sattwic principle.</div><div styleWitness State?=="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-divine-shakti#p9</ref></u></div>

<div style=It is difficult to say generally what is conscious; but naturally, if something observes, it is always the "color:#000000;witness">..with regard to the movements and experiences element in this part—in each part of the body being there is something which is a "witness", which looks on. There is even a physical witness which can get very much in the mind will come to know the Purusha seated within way; for instance, if it aswatches you playing, firstthis can paralyse you considerably. There is also a vital witness which looks at you, sees your desires and enjoys highly all that happens; it acts also as a brake. There is the mental witness or observer of the movements andwhich judges ideas, which says, secondly"This idea contradicts this other", and which arranges everything. Then there is the knower or perceiver of the experiences. It will cease to consider in thought or feel in sensation these movements and experiences as its own but rather consider and feel them as not its owngreat psychic Witness, as operations of Nature governed by who is the qualities of Nature and their interaction upon each otherinner divinity.</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2304/the22-releasemarch-from-subjection-to-the-body1951#p4p6</ref></u></div>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>The Purusha and Prakriti are on the mental level as in the rest of our being closely joined and much involved in each other and we are not able to distinguish clearly soul and nature. But in the purer substance of mind we can more easily discern the dual strain. The mental Purusha is naturally able in its own native principle of mind to detach itself, as we have seen, from the workings of its Prakriti and there is then a division of our being between a consciousness that observes and can reserve its willpower and an energy full of the substance of consciousness that takes the forms of knowledge, will and feeling. This detachment gives at its highest a certain freedom from the compulsion of the soulby its mental nature.~</div><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-divine-shakti#p8</ref></u></spancenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">"The Shaktiwitness Purusha in the mind observes that the inadequacy of his effort, all the power inadequacy in fact of man's life and nature arises from the Infinite separation and the Eternal descends within usconsequent struggle, workswant of knowledge, breaks up our present psychological formationswant of harmony, shatters every wall, widens, liberates... she frees the consciousness from confinement in the body; it can go out in trance or sleep or even waking and enter into worlds or other regions want of this world and act there or carry back its experienceoneness. It spreads is essential for him to grow out, feeling the body only as a small part of itselfseparative individuality, and begins to contain what before contained it; it achieves the cosmic consciousness and extends itself universalise himself, to be commensurate make himself one with the universe. It begins to know inwardly and directly and not merely by external observation and contact the forces at play in the world, feels their movement, distinguishes their functioning and This unification can operate immediately upon them as be done only through the scientist operates upon physical forces, accept their action and results in soul by making our soul of mindone with the universal Mind, our soul of lifeone with the universal Life-soul, our soul of body or reject them or modify, change, reshape, create immense new powers and movements in place of one with the old small functionings universal soul of the nature. We begin to perceive the working of the forces of universal Mind and to know how our thoughts are created by that working...physical Nature."</div><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother , 7 November 1956)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/0824/7the-perfection-novemberof-1956the-mental-being#p1p15</ref></u></span>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>It is thus by an integralisation of our divided being that the Divine Shakti in the Yoga will proceed to its object; for liberation, perfection, mastery are dependent on this integralisation, since the little wave on the surface cannot control its own movement, much less have any true control over the vast life around it...It begins to know inwardly and directly and not merely by external observation and contact the forces at play in the world, feels their movement, distinguishes their functioning and can operate immediately upon them as the scientist operates upon physical forces, accept their action and results in our mind, life, body or reject them or modify, change, reshape, create immense new powers and movements in place of the old small functionings of the nature.~</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the-ascent-of-the-sacrifice-ii#p29</ref></u></divcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">Man is a type among many types so constructed, one pattern among the multitude of patterns in the manifestation in Matter. He It is possible for the most complex that has been created, the richest in content of consciousness and the curious ingeniousness of his building; he is the head of the earthly creation, but he does not exceed it…. If there is a perfection Purusha to which he has to arrive, use it must be on the mental plane itself for a perfection in his own kindconstant self-observation, within his own law of beingself-development,—the full play of itself-modification, but by observation of its mode and measureto sanction, not by transcendence. To exceed himselfreject, to grow into the supermanalter, to put on bring out new formulations of the nature and capacities of establish a god would be calm and disinterested action, a contradiction high and pure sattwic balance and rhythm of his self-lawits energy, impracticable and impossible</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u>a personality perfected in the sattwic principle. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/2224/manthe-anddivine-the-evolutionshakti#p8p9</ref></u></div>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>In the animal mind is not quite distinct from its own life-matrix and life-matter; its movements are so involved in the life movements that it cannot detach itself from them, cannot stand separate and observe them; but in man mind has become separate, he can become aware of his mental operations as distinct from his life operations, his thought and will can disengage them selves from his sensations and impulses, desires and emotional reactions, can become detached from them, observe and control them, sanction or cancel their functioning: he does not as yet know the secrets of his being well enough to be aware of himself decisively and with certitude as a mental being in a life and body, but he has that impression and can take inwardly that position.~</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/22/the-evolution-of-the-spiritual-man#p6</ref></u></divcenter>

== Chitta ...with regard to the movements and Selfexperiences of the body the mind will come to know the Purusha seated within it as, first, the witness or observer of the movements and, secondly, the knower or perceiver of the experiences. It will cease to consider in thought or feel in sensation these movements and experiences as its own but rather consider and feel them as not its own, as operations of Nature governed by the qualities of Nature and their interaction upon each other. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the-release-from-subjection-to-the-Observation ==body#p4</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>Chitta, the basic consciousness, is largely subconscient; it has, open and hidden, two kinds of action, one passive or receptive, the other active or reactive and formative. As a passive power it receives all impacts, even those of which the mind is unaware or to which it is inattentive, and it stores them in an immense reserve of passive subconscient memory on which the mind as an active memory can draw.But ordinarily the mind draws only what it had observed and understood at the time,—more easily what it had observed well and understood carefully, less easily what it had observed carelessly or ill understood; at the same time there is a power in consciousness to send up to the active mind for use what that mind had not at all observed or attended to or even consciously experienced. This power only acts observably in abnormal conditions, when some part of the subconscious chitta comes as it were to the surface or when the subliminal being in us appears on the threshold and for a time plays some part in the outer chamber of mentality where the direct intercourse and commerce with the external world takes place and our inner dealings with ourselves develop on the surface.~</div><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-instruments-of-the-spirit#p6</ref></u></spancenter>

= Practice The Purusha and Prakriti are on the mental level as in the rest of Selfour being closely joined and much involved in each other and we are not able to distinguish clearly soul and nature. But in the purer substance of mind we can more easily discern the dual strain. The mental Purusha is naturally able in its own native principle of mind to detach itself, as we have seen, from the workings of its Prakriti and there is then a division of our being between a consciousness that observes and can reserve its willpower and an energy full of the substance of consciousness that takes the forms of knowledge, will and feeling. This detachment gives at its highest a certain freedom from the compulsion of the soulby its mental nature. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-divine-Observation =shakti#p8</ref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>Take one hour of your life, the one which is most convenient for you, and during that time observe yourself closely and say only the absolutely indispensable words.~</spancenter><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/anger#p15 http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/anger#p15</ref>]

{|class="wikitable" style= Positive Attitude =="background-color: #efefff; width: 100%;"|Read Summary of '''[[Self Observation Summary|Self Observation]]'''

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">To become conscious of what is to be changed Dear reader, if you notice any error in the nature is paragraph numbers in the first step towards changing it. But one must observe these things without being despondent or thinking "it is hopeless" or "I cannot change"hyperlinks, please let us know by dropping an email at integral. You do right to be confident that the change will comeedu. For nothing is impossible in the nature if the psychic being is awake and leading you with the Mother's consciousness and force behind it and working in you. This is now happening. Be sure that all will be done@gmail.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>com<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/speech-and-yoga#p53</ref></u></span>|}

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">Despair and despondency are always wrong. If you make a mistake, quietly observe it and correct the tendency next time. Even if the mistake recurs often, you have only to persevere quietly—remembering that nature cannot be changed in a day.</span><span styleReferences ="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/depression-and-despondency#p67</ref></u></span>